This invention relates to a disk changer, and more particularly to a disk changer which includes a rotatable tray having a plurality of accommodation portions arranged in a ring-like configuration. A disk-type recording medium is suitably selected from among disk-type recording media accommodated in the accommodation portions so as to perform recording and/or reproduction and so forth for the selected disk-type recording medium.
A disk changer is conventionally available which includes a rotatable tray having a plurality of accommodation portions arranged in a ring-like configuration for accommodating a plurality of disk-type recording media therein such that major faces of the disk-type recording media oppose each other. The rotatable tray is rotated and a desired one of the disk-type recording media is taken out by a disk takeout mechanism so that recording or reproduction of an information signal onto or from the disk-type recording medium may be performed.
Such a conventional disk changer as described above includes only one recording and reproduction section having an optical pickup, to which a disk-type recording medium taken out from one of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray is transported by the disk takeout mechanism so that an information signal is recorded onto or reproduced from the disk-type recording medium by the recording and reproduction section.
Accordingly, in the conventional disk changer, since it includes only one recording and reproduction section, in order to record or reproduce different disk-type recording media successively, it is necessary to first take out the disk-type recording medium, whose recording or reproduction has come to an end, from the recording and reproduction section once by means of the disk takeout mechanism and accommodate the disk-type recording medium into an accommodation portion of the rotatable tray, and rotate the rotatable tray until the accommodation portion in which the disk-type recording medium to be recorded or reproduced next is accommodated comes to the disk takeout position and take out the disk-type recording medium from the accommodation portion by means of the disk takeout mechanism, and then transport the disk-type recording medium to the recording and reproduction section by means of the disk takeout mechanism to perform recording or reproduction for the disk-type recording medium.
However, when it is intended to perform recording or reproduction for different disk-type recording media successively as described above, two times of transporting operation of the disk takeout mechanism and a rotating operation of the rotatable tray are required before recording or reproduction of the later one of the disk-type recording media is started. Therefore, the conventional disk changer cannot record or reproduce different disk-type recording media incessantly and continuously and is disadvantageous in that it is inferior in convenience in use.
Further, the conventional disk changer does not have a dubbing function of recording an information signal recorded on a disk-type recording medium onto another disk-type recording medium and therefore is disadvantageous also in that it is inferior in functionality.
Furthermore, in the conventional disk changer, a disk-type recording medium transported to and being recorded or reproduced by the recording and reproduction section rotates in such a state that part thereof overlaps with some of the disk-type recording media accommodated in the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray. Therefore, the conventional disk changer is disadvantageous in that, during recording or reproduction of a disk-type recording medium, the rotatable tray cannot be rotated and a new disk-type recording medium cannot be accommodated into a desired one of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray either, and besides a disk-type recording medium cannot be replaced into the rotatable tray readily.
Further, the conventional disk changer includes a detection section for detecting whether or not a disk-type recording medium is accommodated in each of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray and the address of each of the accommodation portions to which addresses beginning with the first address and ending with the nth address are applied.
In the disk changer, after a disk-type recording medium to be recorded or reproduced is inserted through a disk insertion opening and accommodated into one of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray, the rotatable tray is rotated. Then, detection of presence or absence of a disk-type recording medium in each of the accommodation portions and detection of the address of each accommodation portion are performed successively in order by the detection section disposed below the rotatable tray. After the address of the accommodation portion into which the disk-type recording medium inserted through the disk insertion opening has been accommodated is detected by the detection section, the rotatable tray is rotated in a direction based on a result of the detection until the accommodation portion having the detected address comes to a disk takeout position at which the disk-type recording medium can be taken out from the accommodation portion by the disk takeout mechanism. Then, the disk-type recording medium is taken out from the accommodation portion by the disk takeout mechanism and transported to the recording and reproduction section, by which recording or reproduction of an information signal onto or from the disk-type recording medium is performed.
However, if it is tried to provide a plurality of recording and reproduction sections and a plurality of disk takeout mechanisms in such a conventional disk changer as described above in order to augment the functionality and so forth, depending upon the position of the detection section with respect to the rotatable tray, the distances from the recording and reproduction sections to the detection section may be different from each other. If the distances are different in this manner, then the accessing time before recording or reproduction of a disk-type recording medium is started after detection of the same may exhibit a significant difference between the recording and reproduction sections, and in some cases, the convenience in use of the disk changer is deteriorated.